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This video and song remind me so much of my mother-in-law. After 25 years of marriage she decided to go back to school, finish her undergraduate degree, and she is now in her second year of physical therapy school. Her family is of course very proud of her.

These accomplishes come with some downsides, though. Her desire to return to school was born of a sort of “mid-life crisis” typically associated with men. She lost a lot of weight, starting shopping in the junior’s section of department stores, got a boob job, got a sports car, had an affair with a 23 year old. All that good mid-life (or really, three-quarter’s life) crisis stuff. As a result, she is currently separated from her husband and her relationship with her children (her son is my husband) is, as you can imagine, strained.

As a married person, and as someone who believes in the importance of fidelity in marriage, I don’t support her affair. In my opinion, it is inexcusable. (I’m not saying all instances of adultery are inexcusable…sometimes people don’t have a good way out of their marriage, as in the case of a spouse who may be abusive). Her husband is not abusive, she has plenty of resources (read: money) available to her, and if she wasn’t happy in her marriage, she should have left and gotten a divorce. Simple. There was no need to have an affair (with a guy younger than ...

So all this mess over the Lane Bryant ad has got me thinking about the whole plus-size model thing. I personally don’t think plus-size models–or companies that hire them– are doing anything particularly revolutionary. I mean, look at them: they still fit into an idealized mold of what women’s bodies should look like, what with their perfect breasts-waist-hips ratio. Sure, they may have some extra pounds, but they are still damn near perfectly proportioned in a way that a lot of women aren’t.

For this reason, I don’t get that excited when I see a plus-size model in a magazine. What do you think?

So all this mess over the Lane Bryant ad has got me thinking about the whole plus-size model thing. I personally don’t think plus-size models–or companies that hire them– are doing anything particularly revolutionary. I mean, look at ...

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